On the Publication of New Ideas in Management

Abstract

Are the leading management journals unlikely to be first to publish important new ideas? Though an empirical question, the issue is of central concern to scholars at the frontier of theory development. Of 15 core ideas in strategy, we found that the leading management journals were almost never the place of original publication and were slower than other management-related journals to publish subsequent papers containing these new ideas. Is this a shortcoming of the leading journals? Or is it appropriate? We discuss current publishing alternatives and the apparent need for a better forum for the scholarly communication of new ideas in management.

Keywords: new ideas, publishing, leading journals, online publication

JEL Classification: M10, L10